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Ex Locked Shields 2024: "Collaboration is our protection"

Ministry of Defence of The Slovak Republic

29.04.2024

Slovak cyber security specialists once again proved that are among the world's best on the digital battlefield. The Slovakia-Hungary team, comprising representatives of the state, private and academic sectors, gave exceptionally high performance at Locked Shields 2024 (LS24), the world's largest and most complex international live-fire cyber defence exercise (CDX). Only a few points separated them from a medal. In Locked Shields 2024, the NATO team partnered up with Latvia and became the highest-scoring team.

The annual exercise is organised and run by the NATO Cooperative Cyber Defence Centre of Excellence (NATO CCD COE), based in Tallinn, Estonia. Ex Locked Shields 2024 saw the participation of 4,000 experts from more than 40 countries. This 14th iteration of the CDX was in the spirit of "COLLABORATIO TUTELA NOSTRA EST" or "COLLABORATION IS OUR PROTECTION".

The attention of the evaluators, therefore, shifted from an individual NATO member's ability to react to cyber attacks to the collective ability to cooperate, share and act on information effectively with other members and partners to keep services up and running. Reflecting successfully on this goal, the SVK-HUN team had a cyber strategy in place for this exercise - one that was based on professionalism, most technically advanced security systems, and clear communication as the team members worked intensely together to protect the critical infrastructure of a fictional country that found itself under a massive cyber attack.

Slovakia's participation in LS24 was led by Slovak Military Intelligence's Defence Cyber Centre. The Slovak state sector was represented by experts from Government Ministries: the Ministry of Defence, the Ministry of the Interior, the Ministry of Transport, and the Ministry of Foreign and European Affairs. Additionally, there was also wide support from students and teachers from Slovakia's Technical University in Bratislava, Comenius University in Bratislava, Milan Rastislav Štefánik Armed Forces Academy in Liptovský Mikuláš, and young Slovak talents studying at universities abroad - they all came to support our national team.